Japan's ruling camp extends parliament session to enact TPP, pension bills

Japan's ruling parties decided on Monday to extend the current extraordinary Diet session by two weeks in an effort to ratify the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement and to enact a "pension-cutting" bill.

Leaders of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its junior coalition partner Komeito agreed on Monday that the current Diet session, which was set to end on Nov. 30, would be extended by two weeks to run through to Dec. 14.

The extension was partly aimed at ratifying the TPP trade agreement within the current session and making Japan the first signatory to ratify the pact.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has been sticking to his plan of pushing the pact through parliament despite the fact that U.S. President-elect Donald Trump had renewed his pledge in a video message to draw the U.S. out of the TPP the first day in office.

Opposition parties, however, questioned Abe's rush to ratify the pact and said the deliberations should be put off to a regular session of the National Diet starting from early next year.

Another issue in focus in the Diet is a bill on pension reform which passed a House of Representatives committee vote last Friday.

The bill, if enacted, would revise the pension system and allow the pension payments to be cut down when wages of the working population decline. Under the current system, pension payments remain unchanged even when wages of the working population drop.

The ruling parties said the bill would help keeping the pension system sustainable for the future generations, while the opposition said it would bring sufferings to the seniors who are already struggling to live on their pensions.

Analysts here have pointed out that despite strong objection from the opposition parties, the bills on the TPP and on pension reform are set to be enacted due to the parliamentary majority of the ruling coalition. Endit